New York judge rules against vaccine mandate

New York State Judge Ralph Porzio said Tuesday that 16 sanitation workers fired for not complying with a vaccine mandate should be rehired and given back pay. New York City Mayor Eric Adams last month decided to drop a similar mandate for private sector workers, so the sanitation workers, who are public sector workers, filed a lawsuit saying their own mandate was arbitrary. The judge’s ruling only applies to those 16 people. New York City has appealed the ruling. 

What was the judge’s reasoning? The mandate at first said that city employees must show proof of vaccination by November 2021. A separate mandate for public-facing employees of companies went into effect in December 2021 but was amended to exclude performers and athletes. That mandate will be dropped on Nov. 1, but Mayor Adams said ending the mandate for city workers was not on the radar. Porzio ruled that if the city’s mandates were about public health, there would be no exceptions. The city can create public health mandates, but it cannot create a new condition of employment, he said. The decision was not a commentary on the effectiveness of vaccines, Porzio said.

Dig deeper: Listen to Mary Reichard and Jenny Rough’s report in the Legal Docket podcast on Supreme Court cases about COVID-19 mandates.